The Raccoon
by Half-Finished Fics
Summary: ever wonder the story behind Verne's hat?  read and review!


The Raccoon.

Emmett Brown was deeply concentrated. Concentrated, yet alert. The creak of the barn door sounded and he immediately straightened up and wiped the grease off of his hands, he quickly stepped in front of his invention, scrabbling to cover it with a sheet. Whipping around to see who had come in, he sighed and relaxed when he saw it was only his son, Jules.

Emmett pulled the sheet down and went back to work, aware of Jules creeping behind him, watching in fascination.

"The steam generator?" piped the young, yet incredibly articulate voice.

"Yes." Emmett replied as softly as he could for someone who has been going insane because of a roadblock for five hours.

Jules recognized his father's frustration, he cautiously leaned forwards to see what was going wrong, "do you need any help?" he offered, concerned.

Emmett sighed, and flumped down on the straw covered floor. "It's alright, it's nothing you did. I just need some decent technology, things that aren't supposed to be invented for a very long time. It was hard enough repairing the DeLorean thirty years before I invented it, let alone build a time machine from scratch one hundred years before I was supposed to invent one." he sighed again, "I need a break." He muttered.

Jules sat down cross-legged next to him so quickly, it appeared as if his knees had given out. Emmett smiled, and ruffed his son's hair. "Don't worry, I am going to get this thing to work, no matter what." He said.

"Where do we go first, when you get it to work?" asked Jules.

Emmett thought about this for a moment. "Future, far future. Get the thing hover-converted. "Then back to 1985, pick up Einstein, and see if I can stop Marty destroying the time machine."

"Why would he destroy it?"

"I asked him to. A time machine in the wrong hands can be very dangerous, history could be rewritten."

"Then why are you making another one?"

Emmett snorted, and absently reached up and touched his pocket, which Jules knew contained a torn and fixed letter from Marty. He shrugged, smiled, and said, "what the heck."

The door creaked again, Emmett and Jules both whipped around, and recognized the youngest of the family. Verne.

He stomped in a little less gracefully than his older brother, and plunked himself down in the straw as well. "Nothing much else to do." He explained, much more casually than Jules's articulate speech.

The three sat in silence for a little while, then Jules asked, "could you tell us a little about the future?"

Emmett tried to think of something he hadn't already told them, as that question had popped up at least twice a week ever since his boys really understood what having a time machine meant. His eyes widened as he remembered something, something so obvious he was surprised he hadn't mentioned it before. "Have you ever heard of the movies?" he asked.

"The what?" Jules and Verne both chimed.

"Have you ever wondered what it would be like if pictures moved?"

"You can move pictures." Said Jules, always the logical one.

"Ah, but what if the things inside the pictures could move? People, animals, moving as if the picture were alive? Or like a window?" he could tell he had the boys attention now, staring in disbelief. He could recognize that both were also thinking hard, Jules trying to figure out how it worked, and Verne thinking about what it could do.

"How does it work?" asked the former.

Emmett smiled, "it's quite simple, really…" and took a deep breath, which was usually followed by a long string of techno-babble. Verne took it as a cue to leave, and the ten year old began poking aimlessly around the shadows of the barn. No one would notice he was gone, not while his father was in 'Lets-Learn-Stuff!' mode.

And they didn't notice.

They didn't notice for quite a long time, actually, in fact, Emmett had started back on the generator.

Then, they continued not noticing.

That is, until they heard the scream.

Emmett jumped to his feet faster than the 88 mph required for time travel, and ran towards the sound.

Verne stood with his back pressed against the wall, an expression of terror on his face as an enormously fat raccoon sniffed his feet.

Emmett took a cautious step towards the creature, which turned and hissed angrily at him.

"Shoo!" Emmett hissed back.

Just then, a third person ran in the door. "I thought I heard someone screaming." Said the newcomer.

"Clara, get my gun, will you?"

Clara Clayton Brown raised a surprised eyebrow, as she couldn't see Verne in the shadows.

"Please, go get it." urged her husband.

In a few moments, she came back in. Emmett backed up, taking the weapon while keeping his eyes fixed on the creature now sniffing Verne's knees.

"Emmett, what's going on?" asked Clara.

"It's that raccoon." He replied.

"What raccoon?"

"THE raccoon."

"The one that Seamus told you about?"

"The thing's become a bit of a legend these past few weeks."

"Where is it?"

Emmett stepped forwards, and beckoned Clara to follow.

She gave a small gasp. "Verne! Are you okay?"

"Never better." Said Verne in an unusually high voice.

"Emmett, you aren't going to SHOOT it, are you?" asked Clara.

"What else do you expect me to do?"

"You could hit Verne."

"Clara, I can knock a flea off a dog's back at fifty yards. This is a twenty pound raccoon at ten feet."

"EMMETT!"

"Okay…" he circled around to the left side of Verne, and tried to scare the raccoon to a different location.

The scavenger simply sat down with a small whump, and stared at him, as if asking, _'is that the best you can do?'_

Emmett sighed, and slowly inched close enough to the raccoon to poke it with his gun. "Get." He gave it a rather forceful shove, knocking the animal slightly off balance.

The creature yawned, gave him an annoyed look, and waddled away.

Verne gasped, as it seemed he had been holding his breath the entire time. "KILL IT!" he screeched.

"Emmett, don't hurt it." said Clara.

"I'll remain neutral in this matter." Said Jules, calmly.

"Great Scott! It's heading for the generator!" cried Emmett.

"JUST KILL IT!"

ZAP!

BANG!

The raccoon lay on the ground, lifeless. Whether it had been shot first, or electrocuted first, was to be a family debate that would go on for years afterwards.

The four of them made their way cautiously towards it. Emmett stepped forwards and poked it again. "well, that answers that." he said shakily.

One week later.

The Brown breakfast table, lunch table, or dinner table, was widely known to be an incredible arena of scientific and philosophical discussion.

Naturally, Verne was quite practiced at completely zoning out of the conversation.

He focused intently on his plate of eggs, and ignored the sound of Jules and his father getting worked up about ethics and paradoxes.

He was pretty well tucked into his thoughts when he vaguely thought he heard his name. He quickly looked up, "huh?" he said.

Jules snickered. "We were only trying to get your attention for an entire minute."

Verne gave his brother a death stare.

"What I was just saying," said Emmett, "is that I've got something for you." He tossed a medium sized, furry object across the table towards him.

Verne looked at it quizzically as he picked it up, and felt his stomach drop when he saw what it was. "Very funny." He said, eyeing the amused expressions of his family members, "is that…?"

"Yes, it's that same raccoon. Thought that after that experience, you might want a little memento." Said Emmett.

Verne tossed it around in his hands for a few moments, looking suspiciously at it, then finally pulled it over his wayward blond hair.

It was warm, to say the least.

He was about to go back to his eggs when he saw Clara giving him the 'What-Do-You-Say' look.

"Erm, thanks." He mumbled.

Emmett nodded, then turned back to Jules and resumed the discussion.

Verne took off the hat and inspected it again. It wasn't that bad really, it was kind of…cool. In its own furry way. He realized he actually kind of liked it. He put it back on.

Yes, he did indeed like it.


End file.
